


Connoisseurs

by Sarah T (SarahT), SarahT



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 04:54:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13943022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SarahT/pseuds/Sarah%20T, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SarahT/pseuds/SarahT
Summary: It takes something special to woo Mycroft Holmes.  Moriarty is up to the task.





	Connoisseurs

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Spike and Anarfea for betaing. The spark for this story was a scene in the latter's [Three Little Pigs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12132402/chapters/27520041). 
> 
> Part of this story was originally posted on tumblr as "Ornament."

Mycroft raised his eyebrow as he looked down into the little box he’d found on the desk in his public office.Cufflinks.But _such_ cufflinks: round double discs of a silver so pale as to suggest moonstone, each opened up by a pointed oval into which were set one or two perfect sky-blue opals.The echoing curves and cool intense colors were an elegant distillation of decadence, enough to make him flush.A touch too sybaritic for him ordinarily to wear, however.After the first seconds of surprise, he closed his eyes, skimmed through a thousand mental images of men’s jewelry, and identified the collection from which they’d been stolen—and therefore the likely thief.The phone rang in synchrony with the thought.

“Do you like them?”

The tone was breathless, earnest and exaggerated at once.Mycroft glanced around in an automatic, but futile, effort to spot the camera.

“Mr. Moriarty.Your interrogation was not a flirtation.”

“Come now, Mr. Holmes, we both know that isn’t true.”

“I never even touched you.”

“Oh, but you wanted to.Night after night, standing there in that lovely Savile Row suit, watching them bruise and blood me.You wanted to break me open and _devour_ whatever’s inside me that’s managed to fascinate your brother so.”

Mycroft thought of him behind the glass: stripped of his suit, pale, huge dark eyes staring.A fevered and eager brain ticking over at top speed even as the body absorbed abuse.Magnetic, yes—the incarnation of Sherlock’s self-destructiveness.It was perhaps inevitable that he’d stirred some echoes of the twinned impulses to eradication and protective tenderness that that quality had always been able to awaken in him.Disturbing that Moriarty had been able to see it, though.“You’re mistaken.I wanted to solve a problem, that’s all.”

“And then our little chats.Oh, you told me such stories.”

“As I recall, we were trading information.”

“About the thing you care most about in the world.Stories you haven’t told anyone else.It was so intimate.But you never said a word about yourself.”

“You didn’t ask.”He affected a slightly wounded tone.

“That’s why I was worried you would think I wasn’t _interested_.I admit, it was Sherlock who caught my eye first.So dramatic—he would stand out anywhere.But then I started to notice you, too, there in the background.No one else had the eye for it, but I did.Even when you were trying to go unnoticed, you couldn’t help yourself…all those textures and tiny patterns, that intense understated detail.A hedonist in a straitjacket of his own design.”

Mycroft cleared his throat.“You’ve certainly expended some imagination on me.”

“No more than you have on me, I’m sure.But I wanted to reassure you.Offer a little symbol of my regard.”

“So you stole Klimt’s cufflinks for me?”

“Something beautiful _and_ unique, Mr. Holmes.No one else can give you such pretty things.”

“They’re not quite my style.”

“No, but they could be.”

Yes; he could see the invitation that they carried.“I’ll have to have them sent back.”

“But I went to so much trouble.Won’t you just put them on the once?You know you want to see how you’d look in them.”

An unbidden memory: Uncle Rudy taking him to the tailor just after he’d lost the weight and before he went to university, staring at himself transformed in the mirror.No doubt trying to overcompensate for his own preferences, Rudy had chosen the most sober and undemonstrative fabrics.He remembered that sudden urge, as he stood there surrounded by textiles that shone or scattered light or wove together the closest complementary colors into fields of subdued but endlessly varying richness, of wanting _more_.He shuddered and swallowed, fingers tightening on the phone.

Moriarty’s voice was coaxing.“If you do it, I’ll tell _you_ a story.”

Given their plan, he thought, he couldn’t pass up the chance.“It had better be a good one.”

A low chuckle, as he reached for the box.“It’ll be worth it…”

 

 

Mycroft slipped his fingers into the ticket pocket of his jacket, which remained where he’d hung it two hours ago, apparently undisturbed.Almost.The slim line of the object inside had changed the way it draped ever so slightly.

The cigarette case was a deep blue enamel in a tiny moiré pattern.The design was a snake of pale green gold, each scale a chip of diamond, two or even three across.The snake curled languidly and irregularly around the case, its body like a sine wave across the back, until the head draped itself across the tail.The snake’s eye was a single larger diamond glittering up at him.

Mycroft felt a spasm of exasperation, until he breathed in.This one had a scent as well.Silk Cuts.The smell triggered the automatic rush of anticipation.It had been a strenuous day.His mind had begun slipping its discipline, focusing on irrelevant details and inventing spurious correlations between them.Nicotine would smooth the surface of the world again. 

He touched the phone screen before it rang.“You don’t have surveillance in this office.”

“In your little Eden?No.I just worked out how long it should take for you to notice my present.Then I added thirty-seven seconds.Was I wrong?”

He grimaced.“No.”

“I didn’t think so.You’ve been very tense and distracted lately.”

Yes, attempting to work out the plan that would lead to Moriarty’s capture or death, preferably the latter.Something Moriarty certainly knew.He drew in a breath, sharp with the sudden adrenaline. 

“This has to stop,” he said.

“No, it doesn’t,” Moriarty answered, sing-song and cheerful.“I would bring you a puzzle instead, but we both know you’re too clever for them.”

Well, it _was_ better than a murder, but there were limits.“This is from the Royal—“

“They don’t even know it’s missing yet, Mr. Holmes.No harm done.You need soothing.Come out and have a smoke.”

“Where you can see me.”

“Yes, _of course_ ,” he said, a little impatiently.“Darling.This is for our _mutual_ benefit.”

It verged on flattering, the comprehensive effort Moriarty was making.

It still had to go back.It had belonged to King Edward, for heaven’s sake.

He put on the jacket, then tucked the case back inside.Outside, in front of the Brutalist building, a chill wind was scouring the plaza.Leaves skipped about, irritatingly distracting.He buttoned up his coat most of the way and pulled on his gloves.Then, suddenly curious, he drew out the case again, gazing at it against the black calfskin of the glove.It looked frankly improbable in the daylight, a treasure lifted from a twilight world.The thumb piece was another diamond set in rose gold.He toyed with it a little longer, fascinated by the way the tiny scales harmonized with the moiré.

“I didn’t know you smoked,” Lady Elizabeth Smallwood said from a few feet away.

He looked up, startled.He hadn’t seen her in a few months; she looked well, cool in a silk suit with her hair in a chignon.She was headed into the building, no doubt for some committee meeting.He hadn’t even noticed.It was too late to hide the case, and impossible to explain it.

“I—Not in some time.”

“And I’ve caught you _in flagrante delicto._ How awkward.”She arched one knowing brow.“That’s a very striking case.Unusually extravagant for you.A gift?”

There was no reason she would recognize it, unless he gave her reason to wonder.Since he couldn’t put it away, he gave it a gentle stroke with his thumb instead.“Yes.”

“From a…friend, I take it.”

He hesitated.“You could say that.”

She smiled.“Your friend certainly seems to have insight into a little-known side of you.”

“Apparently so,” he said.

“Well, I’d better leave you before the decadent image you’re presenting makes me relapse myself,” she said, and went inside.

He looked at the case a moment longer.At this point, he might as well.

He extracted a cigarette from its gold interior and tapped it against the enamel before carefully sliding the case into his trouser pocket.Then he lit the cigarette, cupping his hand to shield the spark against the wind.The warmth spread across his nerves with the first draw, realigning all the out-of-place details with reality.He sighed, closing his eyes.

His phone vibrated against his chest.“Oh, Mr. Holmes,” Moriarty whispered.“You’re spoiling me.The gloves, even.”

He deliberately took another puff before answering.“Mutual benefit, I suppose,” he murmured, luxuriating in the way everything was settling about him, the flush of his cheek against the cold winter air.

“Certainly—“

He heard Moriarty’s breath catch, and catch again, and made the appropriate inference.He ought to be disgusted, he supposed.But the thought of being suspended in Moriarty’s comprehensive hungry gaze brought another rush of adrenaline.So instead, he shut his eyes again and listened to Moriarty breathe, high and fast, as he continued to smoke.

“Oh,” he groaned finally.“Thank you, Mr. Holmes.”

He looked at the butt in his hand and reluctantly moved to throw it away.“I’m going back to work now.This can’t become a habit, Mr. Moriarty.”

Moriarty only chuckled.

“My first task,” he added, “will be having Mr. Sturdevant’s security clearance suspended.”

“After he made this little moment possible?How ungrateful,” Moriarty said.“But do get inside.That woman’s been watching you from the window the whole time.”

He had to suppress a startle.He hadn’t been doing anything visibly inappropriate, but—“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I couldn’t very well begrudge her the view, now could I?”

Moriarty hung up before he could assemble an answer.He didn’t let himself look up as he trudged back inside.But he slid his hand back into his pocket and left it there, caressing the smooth enamel, relishing the abrupt bite of the diamond across his skin.He’d put it in the safe for now, and work out a way to return it tomorrow.

 

Mycroft’s ability to deny that his vanity had been piqued by the weeks of silence vanished when he emerged from his dressing room and saw the pocket watch lying on his pillow, its clear face gleaming in the light from the fire.

The case was all gold, of course.There was no dial.Instead, around the edge of the face, the hours were marked in platinum, as were the multiple half-arcs labelled with precise measurements—days of the month, temperature, power—and the smaller circle of the independent seconds hand at six o’clock that seemed to float above the machinery visible within. What truly caught the eye, though, was that machinery: the myriad of overlapping gears and discs powering the complications, the tiniest springs and levers, and every friction point smoothed with sapphire or rubies, intricacies to bewilder the eye of a lesser man and to soothe his.

“You didn’t think I’d moved on, did you?” came Moriarty’s croon from a dark corner. 

“Mr. Moriarty,” Mycroft said, not able to look away from the bewitching coordinated movements, “you don’t seem to appreciate how difficult it is to return your little gifts undetected.You could get twenty years for this alone.“ 

In fact, he thought wryly, the watch was worth more than the house and all of its legitimate contents.Moriarty was escalating.Just as he was doing in actually breaking into Mycroft’s house personally to deliver the present.Alarming, but, after all, Mycroft had spent the past few weeks escalating, too.

“That’s what makes it special, Mr. Holmes.Why don’t you go ahead and touch it instead of just undressing it with your eyes?”

He was going to have to anyway.Of course, he ought to use gloves, but…

“Oh, live a little,” Moriarty urged, clearly reading his thoughts.

The case was perfectly smooth against his fingers.He was surprised to find that the watch wasn’t, in fact, weightless, gold to airy thinness beat.He let the weight gather a little in his fingers, entranced.

When he finally looked up, Moriarty was standing right in front of him, drinking him in.He’d dressed for the occasion himself, in a navy Westwood and silvery tie.His pocket square, a deeper grey, was patterned over with tiny ravens.Unarmed, except with the razor intelligence in his eyes.He’d taken impressive care to shed the details that would tell Mycroft where he’d been recently and where he planned to go next—he offered Mycroft nothing but the immediacy of his presence. 

“It _is_ magnificent,” he said honestly.

He dragged his teeth over his lower lip, continuing to stare.“It suits you.” 

“But why this compulsion to play dress-up in the first place?”

“It’s such a cerebral little game.Deciding what would look good on you, figuring out how to steal it, plotting how to penetrate your security…I get to think about you all the time.Really draws it out, you know?The pleasure.”

“I would have thought,” Mycroft said, “from your conduct of the past year or so, that you were thinking exclusively about Sherlock.”

Moriarty smiled and reached out to toy with the corner of his pocket square.“Sherlock is a wreck.And it’s delightful.”He looked up at him, coquettishly.“But you…the idea of making you even more perfect and then ruining it, of emptying you out and leaving the facade intact…it’s just as intoxicating.”

Mycroft’s breath caught.Intoxicating to be the subject of such desires, too.

“And you must like it yourself, or you would have already called security on the world-class criminal lurking in your bedroom.So kindly stand there with that time I’ve stolen for us in your hand and let me ruin you.”

He dropped to his knees and nuzzled into Mycroft’s hardening cock.Mycroft’s fingers twitched, but he didn’t push him away.Project Lazarus would begin operations in only a few weeks.Moriarty must know that—not the details, of course, but that they were closing in on his destruction.Yet there he was.The recklessness from someone ordinarily so meticulous sent a thrill up his spine, and his hand closed on the back of Moriarty’s neck.

Moriarty took that as permission and undid his trousers.Mycroft didn’t dare cast the watch aside, so he clutched it against his chest with one hand while he held on to Moriarty with the other.There was something uncanny about Moriarty’s knowing abandon, the way he took the abasement as just the next level of the game.But he wasn’t going to be able to play with impunity, not anymore.Mycroft dug his fingers into his shoulder, hard enough to leave bruises.“You’re shameless, aren’t you?”

Moriarty pulled away for a moment.“I haven’t anything to be ashamed of, darling.You, though…seduced by a few pretty trinkets like a bored housewife…”

“More by the thought of you going eagerly to your knees despite all that I’ve done to you.”

He shook his head.“Not _despite_ , Mr. Holmes, _because of_.You, so proper, so clever, so careful, and yet, when it comes to me, still not able to help it…ah…”

Moriarty swallowed him again.Mycroft watched him.He _was_ beautiful, slender in his own more narrowly-tailored suit, delicate features outlined by the flickering firelight.He was completely surrendered to the task in front of him.The provocation had vanished.He’d fallen into a sweet, slow rhythm, as if he wanted to force Mycroft to dwell in the pleasure rather than rush through it, to build a long loop of memory that Mycroft wouldn’t be able to stay away from in the future.Mycroft toyed with being contrary for the sake of it, taking over the rhythm and setting a punishing pace.But the idea of drawing out the moment when the man who’d threatened to realize his darkest fears instead poured all that ingenuity into giving him an extraordinary blowjob proved stronger.So he let the pleasure build until he was breathless and off-balance.He could feel the pressure seizing every muscle and knew that in a second he would separate from himself.

“Mr. Moriarty,” he gasped.

Moriarty gave him only the slightest flick of his eyes, gorgeously indifferent to what was about to happen, and that was enough.

Moriarty didn’t flinch or draw back, only swallowed with the same artful willingness as before.Mycroft’s hand had gone to the back of his head, and, as he looked down at him, eyes now closed, he felt a sudden curl of melancholy.For the moment, Moriarty was still under his hand, the chaos gone quiet, all the self-destructiveness safely absorbed.But in a second he would open his eyes, and—

“You’re not going to understand,” Moriarty murmured.“You’ll destroy me without understanding.”

“I understand enough,” he said, releasing him and sitting down on the bed, setting the watch next to him.

Moriarty smiled slyly.He slid forward between Mycroft’s legs and retrieved his own pocket square from its place.He locked eyes with Mycroft and began to stroke himself.But his gaze wasn’t, as Mycroft had expected, implicating.He supposed he’d been implicated enough already.Now he simply wanted Mycroft to be there and watch him give himself up.He wanted something like the adoration he’d just given.Mycroft felt another twitch.He was the crack in the universe Sherlock was drawn towards, and he would always have that fascination, but he couldn’t—

But Moriarty was already twisting and biting hard into his lip.Mycroft did automatically draw back, but Moriarty had caught the release neatly.Still looking at him, he dropped the pocket square to the floor.Then he turned his head away, swallowing, and there was only the sound of his breathing slowing.

When he’d caught his breath, he got to his feet.“Well.”

“Leaving so soon?” Mycroft inquired, uncertain as to how he felt about that but knowing better than to betray it.

“Normally I’m a big fan of the afterglow.But I _have_ had my fill of your hospitality, darling,” Moriarty answered.A darker series of images flashed into Mycroft’s mind: Moriarty _kept_ , locked away, punished, helpless to do anything but surrender again and again.He shook them off, but something must have shown on his face, because Moriarty gave him a smile that was almost tender.“You see?”

“I trust there’ll be no more of _this_?” Mycroft nodded at the watch.

“After getting that kind of reaction?” Moriarty shook his head, chuckling.“You really don’t know anything about psychology, do you?This wasn’t the way to stop me, Mr. Holmes.”

Mycroft knew.He knew how he _was_ going to stop him, within a sufficient margin of error.Eighty-nine different branches of events in Project Lazarus, and in not one of them did Moriarty remain whole.He couldn’t rescue Sherlock from himself, but he could put an end to this temptation, this howling vacuum that pretended to be a puzzle.A brief replay of those particular calculations in his mind, and he was able to give Moriarty a cold smile.“Then I suppose I’ll have to escalate my response.”

“Darling.”Moriarty grinned, this time a death’s-head.“I’m counting on it.”

After he’d gone, Mycroft picked up the watch again, gingerly, and examined it for damage.He was relieved to find none.His gaze was drawn again by the complex interplay of exquisitely precise parts.The system still functioned.Tomorrow, he’d restore it to its proper place.For tonight, though…

He finished dressing, slipped it into his vest pocket, and went out.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Curious about Jim's little presents?
> 
>  
> 
> [Reproduction of Klimt's cufflinks](https://shop.neuegalerie.org/products/hoffmann-cufflinks-1)
> 
>  
> 
> [Faberge cigarette case](https://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/40113/cigarette-case)
> 
>  
> 
> [Marie Antoinette's Breguet pocketwatch](https://www.sunnyskyz.com/blog/1221/The-Most-Expensive-Pocket-Watch-In-The-World-Made-For-Marie-Antoinette) (sized down for the purposes of this story!)


End file.
